1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a flat mail sleeve packaging system and method of use and, more particularly, to a flat mail packaging system used for packaging counter rotated bulk flats into a bundle.
2. Background Description
Publishers throughout the world print bulk flats (i.e., magazines, newspapers or other items typically less than 1¼ inch in thickness) which are delivered to the end consumer by a postal service or other delivery or transportation company. However, these products typically have bound edges and non-bound edges, where the bound edges are thicker than the non-bound edges. This difference in thickness may cause a “banana” effect or a tipping of the product when stacked at the publishing facilities.
To ensure that the “banana” effect or tipping does not occur, the publisher will either tightly wrap the bundle or, more commonly, assemble the stacks of their product in a counter rotated bundle, i.e., with the bound edges rotated every so many pieces in order to maintain a straight stack. In the former stacking process, the product is bound so tightly with several straps, shrink wrap and the like that the product is damaged during the bundling and transportation process. By using the counter rotation procedure, however, a mail sorting facility, whether it be a postal facility or other delivery or transportation facility, must reorient the stacks so that all of the bound edges are aligned. This allows for the sorting machines to properly sort and prepare for delivery of the product.
By way of example, in most modern postal facilities, major steps have been taken toward mechanization (e.g., automation) by the development of a number of machines and technologies. These machines and technologies include, amongst others, letter sorters, facer-cancelers, automatic address readers, parcel sorters, advanced tray conveyors, flat sorters, letter mail coding and stamp-tagging techniques and the like. As a result of these developments, postal facilities have become quite automated over the years, considerably reducing overhead costs.
In use, these machines and technologies such as flats sorting machines (FSM) are capable of processing more than 10,000 flats per hour by electronically identifying and separating prebarcoded mail, handwritten letters, and machine-imprinted pieces. Computer-driven single-line optical character readers (OCR) are used in this process.
However, many of the machines currently in use including, for example, the FSM require that the mail or flats be oriented in a certain manner in order for the machines to properly sort the mail for delivery. In order to accomplish this task for flats, human intervention is required to complete the product sorting process, i.e., rearrange stacks of flats received from the publisher to align the bound edges, to permit automated feeding of the product. This manual operation is both time consuming and costly, thus increasing overhead and hence delivery rates.